Klimowski Poster Book Review

It is nothing more than wonderful when you find a new avenue of images to capture new worlds. Here in Andrzej Klimowski collected posters, you find this in abundance. Andrzej Klimowski began working for the Polish theatre and film companies after studying at St Martin’s School of Art and Warsaw Academy of fine art. His counterpoising images, collages of faces, surrealism, folk art and the magic of Henryk Tomaszewski (his tutor at the WAFA). He became a voice of radical posters that many still remember. They made statements, turned heads and captured imaginations. Blurring mixed images of violence, erotic art, sexual desire and abstract dreams.

Wow. Selfmadehero seem to find these mountain top flowers. These works that define what would be an epiphany for the cinephile, art aficionados and the graphic art craftier. I was uncertain what to expect originally. I knew of Klimowski and his many stunning images, The poster of Taxi Driver, Nashville and The Omen for instance have been duplicated before in film studies and film art text books. The cover of Katsu Ishiguro novel The Unconsoled was a potent crash of images that I took to heart, while reading it in my 20s. I lived with the image and it lived in my head. The vision of abstraction, surrealism and its metaphor of abandon, were amazing. They were also resonated.

This collection contains these works plus a whole collection of his sublime takes on everything from auteur cinema to the blockbuster release. Klimowski never delineates the film in classic show all splendour. He develops the theme of a film, scatters its thoughts and his together. Then stands back and reveals, shocking flashes of dreams on desire. Layered sexuality and sardonic wit. A blur of identity and iconography. When taking on classic theatre, he mixes the trope with the events. Swiping the body of Juliet with the lesser demon of her desire. When taking on even music, he encourages the art over the commerce. The dream state and its many flickering thoughts over coherence. Stark image smashes into pop art flex and then fuss with a speeding object that blurred reality and stirred our eyes to its rhyme.

Klimowski takes you to a new place. You stand and see with sobriety, its genius.